


What a mess I leave to follow

by maitimiel



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Developing Friendships, Gen, Post-Barricade
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:55:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21896257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maitimiel/pseuds/maitimiel
Relationships: Cosette Fauchelevent & Éponine Thénardier
Comments: 6
Kudos: 8
Collections: Les Mis Holiday Exchange (2019)





	What a mess I leave to follow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ShineyT](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShineyT/gifts).



The bedroom is dark. 

The window opposite the bed has been closed since she first woke up, letting only the thinnest stripes of light inside in the morning. She hasn’t asked to have it open, because she too is afraid of what’s out there: she can’t say for sure if the ghosts of those who died in the barricades scare her more, of those who _didn’t_. Cosette keeps a candle by her bedside, it’s little flame flickering at the slightest breeze, but it’s something. 

Cosette’s eyes are also dark, or at least Eponine thinks so during the brief times she has looked into them. They were never close enough before for her to have become familiar with the shades around Cosette’s eyes, but they feel deep and tired in the half-light. Eponine thinks this is her room, and wonders where Cosette has been sleeping lately. 

Cosette brings her meals and cares for her, and they talk very little. Eponine tries to rest, but her dreams bring no comfort.

* * *

Cosette brings her tea one afternoon, which Eponine accepts with a quiet “Thank you,” watching the cream swirl in the cup. It had been a while since her family was able to afford cream, but as a little girl, that’s how’d she had liked her tea. Cosette often brought it to her then, too. Eponine suddenly finds herself on the verge of tears.

This has been happening a lot lately. 

Everything just seems to surface at once. She doesn’t know where her parents are, or if they’re alive. Worse, she doesn’t know if she wants them to be. She remembers Marius singing to her, his voice ragged as he shivered in the cold rain. Did he make it out? Certainly, if he had, Cosette would be with him now, would she not? Cosette had found Eponine and brought her home herself. She had looked after her every day since, and Eponine could not recall having ever been anything but awful to her. Does Cosette regret bringing her here? Eponine is afraid to find out.

She is shaking silently, and when Cosette walks by the door again, she rushes in. Eponine blabbers a thousand apologies, she’s sorry for taking away her bed and her time, sorry for loving Marius, sorry for never sharing her dolls, sorry for spilling the tea. Cosette pulls her hands into her own, and tells her it’s okay, it’s all okay, and later Eponine won’t remember much about this conversation because apparently she’s burning with a fever, but she’ll remember that Cosette was there, and that Cosette forgave her.

After that, Cosette starts reading to her from her books. Some of them are children’s books, some are love stories she must have gotten as she grew up. Eponine doesn’t know most of them, but Cosette is patient and reads slowly. Her voice stretches through the room light sunlight, and it becomes a little easier to talk to her.

* * *

“I was looking for papá,” she says, one day, as they share a teapot in the kitchen. “We were bound to sail across the sea, and he had one last thing to finish up. I waited at the window, and I dreaded his return because I didn’t want to go.”

Eponine knows a confession. She reaches out across the table, takes her hand. 

“I knew the barricades wouldn’t hold. I wasn’t sad about it.”

Cosette is quiet for a few minutes, thinking.

“I guess life sometimes has felt to heavy a burden.”

“Does it still feel that way to you?” Eponine asks after a pause. Cosette shakes her head.

“You?”

Eponine thinks about it. She thinks of her parents and of Marius, she thinks of the failed revolution.

“Not anymore,” she speaks carefully, as if the words were dangerous. Perhaps they were. Cosette smiles and pours her more tea.

* * *

They walk together through the park, in comfortable silence. Eponine’s eyes map the space around her, the people walking with children and little dogs, couples and families. There are soldiers around if you look for them, but not many, and they look unconcerned. She touches her abdomen, where she’d been wounded that night. If anyone recognises her, they don’t seem to care that she walks freely through Paris.

It’s not the first time they leave the house, but it is the first time they’re out for the sake of being out. It had been Cosette’s idea, this outing. “You look so pale!” she had said, and Eponine is glad she has agreed to come. If feels good to breath fresh air again, to walk among people. She grabs Cosette’s hand, and they move unhurriedly in search of an appropriate spot under the sun. 

They finally settle for a bench a little away from most people, between rose bushes. Cosette has brought a small basket, sandwiches wrapped carefully inside it, and they each take one. 

It disturbs Eponine how little the world seems to have changed since _that night_. The city looks the same. The people in it look the same, with their small worries and concerns as before. She thinks of all that was lost, all the voices she won’t hear again, and suddenly it becomes a little harder to breathe. At the corner of her eyes, she can see Cosette watching her. Cosette’s father never returned home either. 

“Was it all for nothing?” Eponine asks without moving her head. Cosette follows her gaze, eyes landing on a ragged child being scolded by his mother. They’re too far for the two of them to hear what it is about. 

“No, I don’t think so,” Cosette replied slowly, “I do believe there’s a difference, somehow. Maybe we can’t see it yet, but I know it’s coming. I know it.”

Their eyes meet them, and Cosette’s eyes are as honest as any Eponine has ever seen. She reaches for her hand once more, and Cosette puts her sandwich down to hold it again, fiercely. 

“I’m glad you’re here,” Eponine whispers, a smile forcing its way out of her. Cosette smiles back, easily.

“I am too.”


End file.
